Category Archives: Bible Study

God of All Comfort

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This icon at St. Paul’s K Street in Washington DC shows the Holy Trinity visiting Abraham and Sarah in the Old Testament. It reveals the Kingdom of God as the life of the divine community shared with humans by the Holy Spirit. During the Middle Ages, when people did not receive Holy Communion frequently, they said, “Thy kingdom-thy Spirit-come!” as the equivalent of sharing the divine life through the reception of Holy Communion.


Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of mercies and God of all comfort, who comforts us in all our affliction, so that we may be able to comfort those who are in any affliction, with the comfort with which we ourselves are comforted by God. (2 Cor. 1:3-4)

St. Paul writes his second epistle to the Corinthian church about a year after he wrote 1 Corinthians. Some people think II Corinthians is actually parts of two letters put together. We know that the parish in Corinth kept having problems for a long time … St. Clement, one of the early bishops of Rome, wrote letters to the parish in Corinth because they were still having problems in AD 95!

St. Paul begins by blessing God the Father who comforts the Church. Nowadays “comfort” means “feel good” but the Father did not send his Son to make us feel good. “Comfort” used to mean “strengthen” or “make strong.” It means “to be strong with.” The Father gives his Son to make us strong to face affliction and to share this strength with others who are facing various afflictions.

This comfort–strength–is given us by the Holy Spirit. Many times the great preachers and teachers of the past identify the presence of the Holy Spirit with the Kingdom of God; to pray “thy Kingdom come” is asking for the Holy Spirit to come and dwell within us and among us. St. Gregory of Nyssa wrote:

But what does it mean to say that the kingdom of God is within us? It can only mean the gladness which comes from on high to souls through the Spirit! It is like an image and a deposit and a pattern of everlasting grace which the saints enjoy in the time to come. So the Lord summons us through the activity of the Spirit to salvation through our afflictions and to sharing in the goods of the Spirit and his own graces.

St. Gregory of Nyssa, On the Christian Way of Life

The Father shares the Spirit to us now so that we can begin to experience a little bit of what eternity is like. We are called to experience the gift–the presence–of the Holy Spirit not as the absence of affliction but as we are experiencing affliction. The presence of the Holy Spirit –Kingdom of God–is not to make us feel good but to enable us to already experience a little of what we will experience in eternity.

Afflictions are our chance to experience the victory of Christ now. Afflictions are the opportunity we have to know that God truly stands with us, no matter what. Afflictions are our chance to share the Good News with others, not by preaching and lecturing but by holding the hand of someone in pain and being strong together with them.

“Thy kingdom come!” The kingdom–the Spirit–is given to us to share, not to hoard for ourselves. The kingdom-Spirit-gospel-comfort is primarily a SOCIAL experience that God is WITH us here and now rather than an individualistic experience of “salvation.”

Maranatha!

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Christ, vested as a medieval bishop, distributes the Holy Communion to the apostles: on one side, St. Peter leads six others to receive the Holy Bread while St. Paul, on the other side, leads five others to receive from the Holy Cup. In the Didache, the celebrant invites the faithful to Holy Communion: “Let grace come and this world pass away.” The faithful answer: “Maranatha!”


If anyone does not love the Lord, let him be anathema. Maranatha! The grace of the Lord Jesus be with you. My love for all of you in Christ Jesus. (1 Cor. 16:22-24)

These sentences are part of the postscript, the “P.S.” that St. Paul adds in his own handwriting at the end of this first letter to the parish in Corinth. “Anathema” is “cursed” and is the same word the ecumenical councils use when denouncing the teachings that were condemned: “If anyone teaches that the Word is not divine in the same way the Father is divine, let that person be anathema!” Anathema marks those who are excluded from the fellowship of the Church, the Body of Christ.

Although St. Paul had difficult and challenging things to say to the Corinthians, he repeatedly stresses his love for them and that he does not want any one of them to be lost or cast aside. His love for the Corinthians–as a parish community and for each of them personally–is always his prime motivation.

“Maranatha!” can be translated several ways, which is why many translations today leave it untranslated. It can mean, “Come, our Lord!” Or it can mean, “Our Lord comes!” Both meanings are appropriate and maybe St. Paul meant the Corinthians to hear both meanings at the same time. Liturgical practice–described in the Didache— from about the same time that St. Paul was writing these words used “Maranatha!” as the people’s response to the invitation to receive Holy Communion at the Eucharist.

By this one word–Maranatha!–Paul strikes fear into them all. But not only that: he points out the way of virtue. As our love for God’s coming intensifies, there is no kind of sin which is not wiped out.

St. John Chrysostom (4th century), Homily 44 on 1st Corinthians

St. Paul expected his letter to be read at the Eucharist so his comments about the holy kiss and “Maranatha” are also connections to what the parish is about to do: pray together, exchange the Kiss, give thanks, and receive Holy Communion.

“Maranatha!” indeed.

Priscilla & Aquila Greet You

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This icon shows SS. Paul, Priscilla, and Aquila working together as tentmakers and leatherworkers. Apollos is depicted as a child on Priscilla’s lap because she taught him everything he knew about the Faith (Acts 18, Romans 16).


The churches of Asia greet you. Aquila and Priscilla, together with the church in their house, send you warm greetings in the Lord. All the brothers and sisters greet you. Greet one another with a holy kiss. (1 Cor. 16:19-20)

Most letters in AD 1st century closed with a series of greetings. Almost all the epistles of the New Testament close with a series of greetings to those among whom the letter was read. The greetings at the end of 1 Corinthians are the most complex series of greetings at the end of any of St. Paul’s letters. St. Paul greets various people personally and sends greetings from various communities, such as “the churches of Asia” and the parish which meets in the house of Priscilla and Aquila.

Priscilla and Aquila are mentioned several times in the New Testament, in the Acts of the Apostles and in St. Paul’s letters. They were a Jewish-Christian couple and two of the first Christians in the capital city of Rome. When the emperor Claudius expelled the Jews form Rome because of the unrest and riots about Christ, Priscilla and Aquila went to Corinth. Then they moved to Ephesus and lived there, allowing a parish to meet in their home. After Ephesus, they were able to move back to Rome and hosted another parish in their home.

Priscilla is almost always mentioned before her husband, Aquila. This suggests that she was the more socially prominent member of the couple and that her family was more prominent than Aquila’s; yet he does not seem jealous of her prominence. She is often mentioned by early Christians as the probable author of “the Epistle to the Hebrews.” (The other possible author, Apollos, had been her student; she taught Apollos “everything he knew” about Christianity, according to St. Paul. Either way, she was–directly or indirectly–responsible for Hebrews.)

The “holy kiss” exchanged among Christians at the Eucharist was a scandal because people were not supposed to kiss anyone who was not a relative. Rumors of Christians kissing each other made non-Christians think incest and adultery were common Christian practices.

SS. Priscilla and Aquila hosted the Eucharist in their home. During the Eucharist, strangers–or at least, non-relatives–kissed each other. Priscilla and Aquila most have been known for allowing such scandalous and provocative behavior in their home; neighbors probably thought they were encouraging loose morals and sexual immorality and were hosting orgies on a regular basis.

Priscilla taught men the Faith. She and Aquila hosted strangers who kissed each other. Both activities were scandalous. Yet she and Aquila bravely persevered, working with St. Paul to spread and nurture the Church. They remain among the most important people of 1st-generation Christians. Through their teaching and leadership, they—especially Priscilla—have shaped a large part of what we now consider mainstream Christianity.

See my video discussion of St. Priscilla here. be sure to use the password: 3s=c03I=